English Politeness (and Venice here I come!)

Hello - I'm writing from London where I was, thankfully, able to spend the night after two extremely long flights yesterday. We circled Heathrow for about half an hour when they waited for a gate for us - excruciating after 11 hours of flying and 3 hours of layover but I finally made it to my hotel and was reminded of the politeness of the English.

I was awakened at 3:30 in the morning to the sound a of fire alarm - only this one was different than anything I had ever heard before. It was a polite English woman's voice saying something to the effect of, "Notice - we've been informed of a potential need to evacuate the building due to a fire alarm. We will investigate and let you know if you should leave the building." This went on for several minutes until the voice came back on saying, "We're sorry for the inconvenience - it was a false alarm. There is no need to evacuate the building." I've never heard of such a thing but I was grateful I didn't need to groggily run into the street in my jammies as I don't think it would have left me in a very good mood for today!

Which reminds me - I'd better get going. I have to take a bus back to Heathrow airport where I will catch a plane to Venice and then a water taxi to Murano. Can't wait! More updates soon.

I'm Here!

I made it! Murano at last! (That's really the way I felt, by the way, after the flight from Seattle to New York to London to Venice and then water taxi to Murano). Oh my gosh is this place incredible! I wandered the streets (needlessly, I later found out as the apartments are pretty much a straight shot up the street from the taxi) and saw the most romantically old buildings, people doing their Saturday shopping, sitting in cafes - much of what I expected but so much nicer in person! I'm in an apartment with a view of the canal - I'm including some pix below. My roomie and I went up the street to the supermarket and bought food to cook in our little kitchen. What did we make? Why, fritatta of course! We're going in to Venice tomorrow, which is a short water taxi ride away. More pictures then!

Janelle

P.S. On a sad note , when I got here, I found out that my dear grandma had passed away. This trip will be very special as I will remember her and my Italian glass experience.
  View #1 from the apartment.

View #2 from the apartment.

The street on the way to the supermarket.

Ah, it's nice to see family...

I just had family here visiting this weekend. It's so much fun to haul out the beads and vessels and "show off" to my siblings and to my mom, who I don't see often enough.

Seattle is showing it's best weather today - just nothing to complain about. There are only a few weeks of the year when it's unbearably hot here - but it's only about 80 degrees today, blue skies - gorgeous! It does cool off in the evenings in time to torch. Very nice!

I did some shopping for the trip. Someone recommended some little cheese knives from Bed Bath & Beyond. These are used in glass sculpting. It's amazing the things you can use - spoons, butter knives, dental tools. Someone who didn't know what I was doing would be quite confused by my workbench!

I wanted to share another vessel with you today - this one is a lapis blue, coral and lime green hollow vessel - made off the end of a mandrel. I have an idea for a precious metal clay stand for it that I'll make when I come back into Seattle in a few weeks. I plan on selling these little perfume bottles when I get back as well.